Ronald Reagan must be turning over in his grave.
Posted on 04/25/2013 5:55:21 AM PDT by sickoflibs
WASHINGTON (AP) — You don't see this very often: a majority of Senate Republicans voting to make people who buy stuff on the Internet pay state and local sales taxes.
The Senate could vote as early as Thursday on a bill to empower states to require online retailers to collect state and local sales taxes for purchases made over the Internet. Under the bill, the sales taxes would be sent to the states where a shopper lives.
On Wednesday, the bill passed a test vote in the Senate, 74 to 23, with 27 Republicans voting in favor. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., vowed to pass the bill this week, before senators leave for a scheduled vacation.
"This is a matter of equity and fairness," said South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard, a Republican. "The same people who are selling the same products should be paying the same taxes."
Under current law, states can only require stores to collect sales taxes if the store has a physical presence in the state. As a result, many online sales are essentially tax-free, giving Internet retailers an advantage over brick-and-mortar stores.
It is part of GOP orthodoxy to oppose higher taxes, a central issue that divides Democrats and Republicans. That's why the bill faces an uncertain fate in the House, where some Republicans regard it as a tax increase.
But supporters of the bill insist it is not a tax increase. Instead, they say, the bill merely provides states with a mechanism to enforce current taxes.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
McCain I understand but Sessions and Shelby joined him and the Dem tax raisers.
What Congress *should* do is legislate that states may only charge sales taxes in the place where the transaction originates, which, in the case of Internet or catalog transactions, is where the store is located. So if a company is based in California, and California charges a 5% sales tax, everyone who orders from such company will be charged the 5% sales tax, irrespective of where they live. (And in the case of a brick-and-mortar store, everyone would get charged the sales tax, even if they asked for the product to be shipped to another state.) If this causes companies who sell a lot through the Internet or catalogs to relocate to states with no sales tax, then good for them. And if it results in states lowering their sales tax to be more competitive, then even better.
And before anyone objects to Congress legislating over state tax collections, what I’m proposing would be as basic a regulation of interstate commerce as you will ever find (it would be prohibiting states from laying taxes on companies located outside the state), and Article I, section 8, clause 3 of the Constitution ennumerates the regulation of commerce among the states among the express powers of Congress.
Local government (at least around here) is primarily a mechanism to funnel money from tax payers to real estate developers. If those tax payers don’t go along, the local government threatens to withhold essential services like police and fire. Our town can find $250,000,000 to give to developers to build a sports arena, but can’t do anything about homeless people sleeping and defecating on the streets.
Time to short FedEx and UPS.
Anyone who supports increasing my taxes, whether that person is businessman or an otherwise conservative Senator or Governor, is a filthy pig who should be forced to chug motor oil till he vomits up a lung.
Governor Daugaard can go straight to hell and he can take his store owners with him. Store owners want to hire illegals to work for cheap and to tax internet sales to drive down competition. Screw them.
From the article: “That’s why the bill faces an uncertain fate in the House, where some Republicans regard it as a tax increase”
Regard it as. Hmm, I guess that depends on what the meaning of “increase” is. The author of that piece should be kicked in the gonads, if he has any.
I think you are missing the difference between raising taxes and collecting taxes.
I think that is the way it is now, they can do that now. But states dont want to do that because it hurts companies in their states vs others.
This bill allows them ‘in effect’ to raise taxes in other states, the businesses in other states. That is what they want.
Well now online retailers will have to bone up on the sales tax rates for every county in every state in the Union. If you have ever filled out a sales tax form just for your own state you will know what a nightmare it is.
Between the sales tax and the shipping charges the internet will be killed. Great!!!!!!!!!
Applying a tax to something it’s not currently applied to has the same effect as raising taxes and therefore is raising taxes for all practical purposes. Semantics.
We don’t need to vote for 2014. We already have majority dems in the senate.
Ronald Reagan must be turning over in his grave.
The masters $$$$ command both parties in the Senate with $$$, and they DEMAND amnesty workers and demand raising sales taxes on us and those online businesses, by being the tax collector for the states here.
Like i said, the GOP will fight tooth and nail against a Warren Buffet tax on themselves, but raising taxes on us the middle class who use the internet with credit cards is on the top of their lists.
Sales taxes are set at the state, county and city level so I would guess there will be many thousands of taxing entities that internet retailers will have to deal with. Small internet retailers might not have the wherewithal to deal with this. The big retailer will so mom and pop retailer just took it on the chin. I certainly understand the fairness compliant that physical retailer make but most have and internet shopping too so I am not all that sympathetic. I see this as another win for big money and another lose for the little guys. I am not surprised, Congress long ago stopped representing the interests of small town America.
I must admit I don’t care if failing to tax internet sales is “fair” or not. We all pay enough taxes, period. I oppose any increase of the onerous the tax burden. I’m a realpolitik kind of guy.
The only people that don’t pay “their fare share” are the welfare bums and corrupt scum who live off government contracts and grant. The people that own our “leaders”.
Well stated.
I agree - this is a dagger aimed at the small online retailer.
BTW...ATR/Norquist is all for this bill.
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